J U L Y 2 0 2 1I S S U E 7 3

U . S . D E F E N S E O F T A I W A NI N T H I S I S S U E

I A N E A S T O N • J O S E P H F E L T E R • A D M I R A L G A R Y R O U G H E A D

EDITORIAL BOARD

V i c tor Davis H anson, ChairB ruc e T hornton

David B erkey

CONTRIBUT ING MEMBERS

P eter B erkowitzJ osiah B unting I I I

Angelo M. CodevillaAdm iral J am es O . E llis J r.

Niall F ergusonChris Gib son

J osef J offeE dward N. L uttwak

P eter R . MansoorWalter R ussell Mead

Mark Moy arWilliam son Murray

R alp h P etersAndrew R ob erts

Adm iral Gary R ougheadK ori Sc hake

K iron K . SkinnerB arry Strauss

B ing WestMiles Maoc hun Yu

ABOUT THE POSTERS IN THIS ISSUE

Documenting the wart ime viewpoints and diverse polit ical sent iments of the twentieth century, the Hoover Inst itut ion

Library & Archives Poster Col lect ion has more than one hundred thousand posters f rom around the world and

cont inues to grow. Thirty-three thousand are avai lable online. Posters f rom the United States, the United Kingdom,

Germany, Russia/Soviet Union, and France predominate, though posters f rom more than eighty countries are included.

C O N T E N T SJ u l y 2 0 2 1 • I s s u e 7 3BACKGROUND ESSAYWill America Defend Taiwan? Here’s What History Says b y I an E aston

FEATURED COMMENTARYRealism and Deterrence in Cross-Strait Relations b y J osep h F elterTaiwan: Time for a Real Discussion b y Adm iral Gary R oughead

REL ATED COMMENTARYTaiwan: Deterrence of China Is Failing b y Gordon G. ChangPut Nukes on Taiwan b y Angelo M. CodevillaThe Defense of Taiwan b y Seth Crop seyThe Taiwan Question by Edward N. LuttwakStrategic Ambiguity and the Defense of Taiwan b y P eter R . MansoorU.S. Resolve Is Taiwan’s Best Defense by Mark MoyarThe Crucial Importance of Taiwan b y William son MurrayTaiwan b y P aul R aheDefending Taiwan b y Andrew R ob ertsFive Reasons Why Taiwan Should Lie within the Defense Umbrella of the United States b y Miles Maoc hun Yu

EDUCATIONAL MATERIALSDiscussion QuestionsSuggestions for Further Reading

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Background Essay | ISSUE 73, July 2021

Wi l l Amer ica De fend Ta iwan? Here ’s What

H is tory SaysBy Ian Easton

In December 1949, Chiang Kai-shek moved the capitol of the R ep ub lic of China ( R O C) to T aip ei. H e intended the relocation to be temporary. He had already moved his government multiple times: when the Empire of J ap an invaded China, when World War I I ended, and again when Mao Zedong’s Communist insurgents took the up p er hand in the Chinese Civil War.

To Chiang’s eyes, Taiwan was the perfect place to refit his tattered forces and prepare them for the long struggle ahead to defeat the Com m unists. T he m ain island was protected by dozens of tiny island citadels, many just off the mainland coast, and surrounded by fam ously rough waters. While Chiang’ s arm y had sus-tained crushing battlefield defeats and mass defec-tions, he believed his superior navy and air force would make Taiwan an impregnable fortress.

The events that followed presented successive U.S. presidents with some of the most consequential foreign policy questions ever confronted by America’s leaders. During the decades since 1949, there have been several inc idents that tested whether or not Washington was willing to c onfront the Chinese Com m unist P arty ( CCP ) and sup p ort T aiwan. I f p ast is p rologue, how the U nited States resp onded to p revious c rises m ight say som e-thing im p ortant ab out what it will do in the future. So, what does the historic al rec ord say ? What m ight we expect to see if China attacks Taiwan in the 2020s or beyond?

The Korean War

On January 12, 1950, U.S. secretary of state Dean Acheson gave a speech in which he suggested that America no longer intended to defend its erstwhile allies the R ep ub lic of K orea ( South K orea) and the R ep ub lic of China ( T aiwan) . Ac c ording to Ac heson, those governm ents were outside of Am eric a’ s defensive p erim eter in Asia. H is sp eec h enc ouraged the newly estab lished P eop le’ s R ep ub lic of China ( P R C) to ac c elerate p lans to invade T aiwan. B ut b efore Mao Z edong and his generals c ould ac t, their North K orean ally K im I l-sung launc hed an invasion of South K orea.

On learning of the attack, President Harry Truman decided that the U.S. would defend both Korea and Taiwan, and ordered the U.S. Navy to forestall the CCP from attacking the ROC’s last redoubt. On June 29, 1950, an American aircraft carrier, heavy cruiser, and eight destroyers sailed into the Taiwan Strait to con-duc t a show of forc e within visual range of Com m unist forc es array ed along the m ainland c oast. Soon there-after, armed American seaplanes were stationed on the Penghu Islands and began to search for any hostile m ovem ents toward T aiwan.

T o further enhanc e its early -warning p ic ture, the U . S. sent sub m arines to m onitor Chinese p orts ac ross from Taiwan, areas where enemy vessels were expected to marshal if an invasion was imminent. In addition,

Image credit: Poster Collection, CC 132, Hoover Institution Archives.

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four American destroyers were stationed in Taiwan. Their mission was to patrol near the coast of China, with at least two warships watching around the clock for signs of a pending amphibious assault. The Taiwan Patrol Force, as the mini-surveillance fleet became known, operated continuously for nearly three decades to c om e.

Soon thereafter, the U.S. established a defense command in Taipei and sent a Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) to Taiwan under the command of a two-star general. This organization was tasked with pro-viding training, logistics, and weapons to the ROC military in order to develop it into a modern fighting force. By 1955, there were tens of thousands of American troops stationed in Taiwan, including over two thousand military advisors, making MAAG the largest of the U.S. advisory groups then deployed around the world. In the following years, MAAG transformed the ROC military into one of Asia’s most capable fighting forces.

The 1954–1955 Taiwan Strait Crisis

In August 1954, the Chinese Communists launched a string of operations against ROC forces along the mainland coast. Mao and his top lieutenants judged that by attacking the offshore islands they could drive Washington and Taipei apart and set the stage for a final invasion of Taiwan. They began by shelling Kinmen and Matsu, island groups located just off the coast of Fujian Province. Not long after, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) launched air and sea raids on the Dachens, a group of islands 200 miles north of Taiwan, near Taizhou in China’ s Z hej iang P rovinc e.

In November 1954, the PLA encircled Yijiangshan, a ROC island base located at the extreme northern flank of the Dachens. Using modern equipment and tactics from the Soviet Union, the PLA carried out a suc-cessful invasion operation, taking the island on January 18, 1955. In response, the U.S. Navy steamed into the area with 70 ships, including seven aircraft carriers. The Americans then launched Operation King Kong, the evacuation of the Dachens. U.S. Marines assisted ROC forces to safely move some 15,000 civilians, 11,000 troops, 125 vehicles, and 165 artillery pieces back to Taiwan with no casualties.

On March 3, 1955, Washington formally cemented a mutual defense treaty with Taipei. President Dwight E isenhower also rec eived p erm ission from Congress to ex erc ise sp ec ial p owers in the defense of T aiwan, granted by the Formosa Resolution. In May 1955, the PLA stopped shelling Kinmen, and, three months later, the CCP released 11 captured American airmen. The 1954–1955 Taiwan Strait Crisis was over, but the stand-off continued.

The 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis

On August 23, 1958, the PLA launched a surprise attack on Kinmen, showering the island group with tens of thousands of shells as a p relude to p lanned am p hib ious landings. B eij ing sought to test the resolve of the Americans, seeing if the seizure of Kinmen and the threat of war could break the U.S.–ROC alliance apart and dem oralize T aiwan. T he p lan failed alm ost im m ediately . R O C m ilitary engineers had tunneled deep into Kinmen’s granite, carving out subterranean bunkers and strongholds that allowed the defenders to weather the shelling with few casualties. The PLA made an amphibious assault on the nearby island of Tung Ting and was repulsed. To the north, Communist units launched artillery strikes against the Matsu Islands. But those were just as ineffectual.

The U.S. sent in four aircraft carriers, along with a large number of cruisers, destroyers, submarines, and amphibious ships. The American fleet was equipped with low-yield atom bombs, designed to stop a poten-tial human-wave assault on the islands, a PLA tactic previously seen in Korea. After torpedo boats and artil-lery began to target ROC Navy ships resupplying Kinmen, the U.S. Navy began escorting the convoys from Taiwan with cruisers and destroyers. On September 18, 1958, American artillery guns were rolled ashore Kinmen, which were capable of firing tactical nuclear shells that could incinerate any invader (the shells were kept aboard U.S. Navy ships located nearby). The colossal guns also fired conventional rounds that increased the garrison’s firepower and morale.

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During the c risis, R O C Air F orc e p ilots used new Sup er Sab re j ets and Sidewinder m issiles to engage P L A MiG-17s in air-to-air combat. The results were decisive: ROCAF pilots achieved 33 enemy kills in return for the loss of four of their own. On October 6, Beijing announced a cease-fire under pressure from its Soviet allies, who feared the fighting could escalate and go nuclear. The 1958 Crisis was over and Taiwan’s offshore island b ases rem ained undefeated.

The 1995–1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis

In the early 1990s, Taiwan began peacefully transitioning to a democracy. With the Cold War over, it seemed hopeful that the U.S. and other nations would recognize Taiwan as a legitimate, independent country. T aiwan’ s p resident, L ee T eng-hui, p ub lic ly signaled that, in his view, the Chinese Civil War was over; T aiwan was now the R O C, the R O C was T aiwan, and his c ountry would no longer c laim sovereignty over territory controlled by the authorities in Beijing.

In June 1995, President Lee returned to his alma mater, Cornell University, to announce Taiwan’s plans to hold free and fair elections. The CCP responded by conducting a series of ballistic missile tests, firing rockets into the waters north of Taiwan. In August, the PLA moved a large number of troops to known invasion stag-ing areas, conducted naval exercises, and carried out further missile firings. That November, the Chinese military staged an amphibious assault drill. In March 1996, just before the elections, the PLA fired more bal-listic missiles into waters directly off Taiwan’s two largest ports, and implicitly threatened to turn a planned exercise into a real invasion operation.

T he U . S. p lay ed an im p ortant role throughout the c risis. P resident B ill Clinton resp onded to B eij ing’ s p rovoc a-tions by sending two carrier battle groups to waters near Taiwan. The American demonstration succeeded: China backed down, and Taiwan’s elections went ahead as planned. President Lee won the elections with a decisive margin, and the 1995–1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis ended on a positive note. Nonetheless, Taiwan remained diplomatically isolated and has slowly become more vulnerable over time, a trend that continues unab ated to p resent day .

Implications for the Future

While all historic al analogies are im p erfec t, p rec edents p reviously set c ould p rovide Am eric an leaders with a guide in sub seq uent sim ilar c irc um stanc es. T he rec ord of p ast p olic y dec isions m ade b y Washington dem -onstrates that, when tested, American presidents have always viewed it in their nation’s interest to come to Taiwan’s defense, even amid situations that could have escalated to the level of nuclear warfare. In 1958, for ex am p le, Washington was resolved to defend T aiwan against invasion even if that req uired the use of battlefield atomic weapons—and even if such usage invited nuclear retaliation from the Soviet Union, which was then c losely aligned with B eij ing.

Perhaps even more notable were those American leadership decisions undertaken in the 1995–1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis. In that instance, the U.S. deployed aircraft carrier battle groups to waters near Taiwan in sp ite of the fac t that the CCP had rec ently detonated two nuc lear warheads at a test site; had c arried out multiple tests of nuclear-capable ballistic missiles; and, in back-channel conversations, had implicitly threat-ened Los Angeles with nuclear attack. The resolve displayed by Washington in 1996 might be considered particularly remarkable given that the U.S. no longer diplomatically recognized Taiwan’s government at the time.

To date, there is no known case in which an American president failed to send forces to support the defense of Taiwan in response to a credible CCP threat. If this track record is indicative of future performance, the years ahead are likely to see the U.S. government continually improve its operational readiness to defend Taiwan in accordance with the evolving threat picture. In times of crisis, American leaders will likely send overwhelming national resources to the Taiwan Strait area and make their commitments to Taiwan’s defense m ore ex p lic it in hop es of c onvinc ing the P R C to deesc alate tensions.

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Background Essay | ISSUE 73, July 2021

Even barring a major political-military crisis, it seems probable that the years ahead will see the U.S. govern-ment improve its early-warning intelligence via regular ship, submarine, and aircraft patrols of the Taiwan Strait; more frequent overhead passes of space and near-space platforms; and expanded intelligence shar-ing arrangements with the Taiwanese security services. It also seems probable that the U.S. will make signifi-cant enhancements to its diplomatic, trade, intelligence, and military presence in Taiwan.

It remains an open question whether a Taiwan Patrol Force and MAAG-like organization will be reestablished—let alone an official country-to-country relationship and defensive alliance. But each could be considered past examples of political and military initiatives that, when combined, were successful in helping to deter CCP aggression. Herein we might find positive lessons for the future.

Ian Easton is a senior director at the Project 2049 Institute and author of The Chinese Invasion Threat: Taiwan’s Defense and American

Strategy in Asia. He previously served as a visiting fellow at the Japan Institute for International Affairs (JIIA) in Tokyo and a China analyst at the

Center for Naval Analyses in Virginia. He has testified before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission and given talks at the U.S. Naval War College, Japan’s National Defense Academy, and Taiwan’s National Defense University. Ian holds an MA in China Studies from National Chengchi University in Taiwan and a BA in International Studies from the University of Illinois–Urbana-Champaign. He studied Chinese at Fudan University in Shanghai and National Taiwan Normal University in Taipei.

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Featured Commentary | ISSUE 73, July 2021

Rea l ism and Deterrence in Cross-Stra i t

Re la t ionsBy Joseph Fe l ter

The Strong Do What They Can and the Weak Suffer What They Must

T he Chinese Com m unist P arty ( CCP ) leadership has never felt more confident that its increasingly capable m ilitary c ould b e dep loy ed to suc c essfully seize T aiwan b y forc e. Dec ades of ex p anding defense b udgets and investment in military modernization have signifi-cantly enhanced the CCP’s potential to project power ac ross the T aiwan Strait. Annex ing what it c onsiders to b e a rogue Chinese p rovinc e and realizing its aim of achieving national reunification remain the CCP’s high-est p olic y p riority . Arguab ly , Chinese leaders have not attempted to forcibly occupy Taiwan to date because of the unc ertainty of their c hanc es of suc c eeding.

It’s in the enduring interests of the United States to help safeguard and protect a flourishing Han Chinese dem oc rac y in the region. Am eric a’ s c om m itm ent to p roviding for T aiwan’ s defense as outlined in the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act should remain strong. But what are the most effective ways to ensure the CCP leadership does not c alc ulate that it c an seize T aiwan at an ac c ep tab le c ost and how c an the U . S. b est c ontrib ute to these ends?

The core tenets of realist theories of international relations are valuable concepts that can help answer these questions. Realists contend that states compete for relative power and survival in what is inherently an anarchic international system where no higher authority exists that can enforce rules and agreements or resolve disputes. Given these conditions, states must rely on “self-help” because ultimately no one but them selves c an b e c ounted on to p rovide for their sec urity .

The fate of the small Aegean island of Melos in the fifth century bc at the hands of the p owerful Athenian m ilitary as rec ounted b y T huc y dides in his History of the Peloponnesian War is a classic case study of politi-cal realism. After the Melians rejected the Athenians’ ultimatum that they surrender their freedom, the Athenians brutally subjugated the weaker Melians, former colonists of Sparta, despite the Melians’ appeals that they wished to remain neutral in the conflict. Unfortunately for the Melians, their hopes that their P elop onnesian allies would c om e to their aid never m aterialized. F or Athens, the c onq uest of Melos dem on-strated the capabilities of its military to all across the region and underscored its willingness to use decisive force to achieve its political aims. The Athenians’ stark acknowledgment that “the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must” captures the essence of how realists view the interaction between nation-states. The characteristics of wars and conquest throughout history indeed reflect these harsh m ax im s.

As Athens demanded the incorporation of Melos into its empire, so China hubristically wishes to do the sam e for T aiwan. I f the U nited States wants to truly m ax im ize T aiwan’ s c hanc es of survival, it will heed the

Image credit: Poster Collection, CC 127, Hoover Institution Archives.

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main tenets of realist theories—and the histori-cal record—in the development and implemen-tation of its policies. Succinctly, U.S. resources and sup p ort should foc us on help ing T aiwan help itself— building its capabilities in ways that pre-vent a strong state like China from calculating that it “can” annex this de facto independent state by force. This calls for a bias towards action not rhetoric , and an em p hasis on b uilding greater self-relianc e versus dep endenc y going forward.

Clarify ing Am eric a’ s c om m itm ent to defend T aiwan if attacked, as some respected policy professionals have c alled for, c ould p rovide an im p ortant signal of U . S. resolve. B ut as realists would argue, and the history of alliances and warfare can attest, suc h ex p ressed c om m itm ents c annot b e c redib ly enforc ed. T he b est way to p revent T aiwan from being attacked is to make the decision to do so untenab le for China b ased on the c ertainty of fail-ure and the inc ursion of staggering c osts. T he less T aiwan m ust rely on the dec isions of foreign lead-ers and sup p ort from outside its own m ilitary to accomplish this, the better it is for all who hope to see this thriving democracy continue to flourish.

T o b e c lear, T aiwan is far from the p oint of b eing able to defend itself from attack, and the capabilities gap is widening, not closing. U.S. interests are well served by continuing to be unwavering with China that it will not tolerate the use of force to change the status quo in the Taiwan Strait, and by credibly demonstrating that America is prepared to intervene militar-ily to help Taiwan defend itself in the event it is attacked. The United States should continue to strengthen its own capabilities to defend Taiwan by investing in the types of defense platforms and employing the operational concepts needed to defeat a rapidly evolving and increasingly capable People’s Liberation Army. America can also seek ways to encourage allies and partners in the region to contribute to deterring conflict over Taiwan short of military intervention, for example, by committing to raise the economic and diplomatic costs China would expect to incur should it choose to attack Taiwan.

Significantly, however, the U.S. should provide incentives and disincentives that encourage Taiwan’s capaci-ties for “self-help,” which realists describe as the only dependable way for states to defend themselves. Encouragingly, Taiwan’s “Overall Defense Concept” (ODC), its current strategy for defending against a Chinese invasion, is a p rom ising ap p roac h that aim s to develop this self-relianc e. I t c alls for the develop -m ent and em p loy m ent of an asy m m etric defense p osture that leverages the inherent defensive advantages Taiwan can exploit to deny the PRC’s ability to successfully invade the island and exert political control over its p eop le.

Concurrent with efforts to ensure the U.S. maintains the capabilities needed to come to the defense of Taiwan and credibly signal its intention to do so, the U.S. should focus on assisting Taiwan in the develop-ment and fielding of the asymmetric capabilities it can employ to best deter and defend against a Chinese attack. For example, provide tangible incentives that encourage Taiwan’s acquisition of larger numbers of smaller/cheaper asymmetric weapon systems like advanced unmanned aerial vehicles, cheap precision guided munitions, and mobile anti-armor and air defense systems, to name a few. Employing a rotational presence of U.S. Special Forces to assist Taiwan in the development and fielding of a decentralized territorial defense force is an example of how U.S. support can be focused on helping Taiwan help itself. Conducting

POLL: How could America help to defend Taiwan?

£ Am eric a should re-p artner with China to find diplomatic solutions.

£ Am eric a should ac c ep t that T aiwan is not a vital U . S. interest and let events p lay out.

£ America can sell weapons and offer intelligenc e to help even the odds.

£ Step p ed-up dep loy m ents of Am eric an naval and air forces will deter a Chinese attack.

£ T aiwan should b e under the Am eric an nuc lear um b rella that alone will ensure its safety .

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Featured Commentary | ISSUE 73, July 2021

Joseph Felter holds researc h and teac hing ap p ointm ents at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution and Center for International

Security and Cooperation (CISAC). From July 2017 to September 2019 he served as U . S. dep uty assistant sec retary of defense for South Asia,

Southeast Asia, and O c eania. J oe’ s researc h foc uses on great-p ower c om p e-tition, counterinsurgency, and counterterrorism. He is coauthor of Small Wars, Big Data: The Information Revolution and Modern Conflict (Princeton University Press, 2018). Joe is a former U.S. army ranger and special forces officer with multiple combat deployments and service in a variety of special operations, diplomatic, and other military assignments. He received a BS from the U nited States Military Ac adem y , MP A from H arvard K ennedy Sc hool of Governm ent, and P hD from Stanford U niversity .

joint training and exercises that hone Taiwan’s asymmetric defensive capacities is another opportunity—albeit provocative in the eyes of Beijing.

It’s in U.S. interests—and the interests of all states committed to safeguarding democratic freedoms in the region—to avoid conflict in the Taiwan Strait. Increasing Taiwan’s capabilities to defend itself, and complicat-ing China’s calculus of its chances of succeeding in the forcible annexation of the island, is the most effective way to deter an attempt by China to do so.

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Featured Commentary | ISSUE 73, July 2021

Ta iwan : T ime for a Rea l D iscuss ion

By Admira l Gary Roughead

There has been a spate of recent articles proffering when the People’s Republic of China (PRC) will likely be capable of invading Taiwan. The prognostications are interesting but unhelpful as they distract from the reality of the range of coercive actions the PRC may im p ose on T aiwan and what c ould hap p en now as a result of the P R C inc reasing p ressure and a related m ilitary ac c ident or m isstep in the vic inity of T aiwan.

T he c urrent Am eric an p enc hant to j um p to m ilitary options to address thorny global problems often casts the Taiwan dilemma in a superficial bilateral or trilat-eral m ilitary c ontex t. T hat ap erture m ust b e op ened more fully to consider the realities, attributes, and inter-ests of Taiwan, and how those factors will influence the methods and timing of Beijing’s reunification objec-tive. Moreover, those realities, some inconvenient, must underpin new and broader thinking about how to ensure T aiwan’ s ex istenc e as a vib rant dem oc rac y .

Geography

Americans are notoriously bad at geography, but geography matters. Even among policy makers, atlases seem to have fallen out of favor. B ut understanding T aiwan’ s c irc um stanc es and assessing p olic y im p lic a-tions must start by looking at a map to avoid glossing over the vastness of the Pacific region, as is usually the c ase. T he E ast China Sea to the north of T aiwan and the South China Sea to its south are an enorm ous expanse of approximately 1.83 million square miles of ocean, roughly equal to two Mediterranean Seas. The Taiwan Strait is 110 miles across, Shanghai to Taipei is 425 miles, Tokyo to Taipei 1,300 miles, and San Francisco to Taipei is just shy of 6,500 miles, or two and a half times the distance from Washington to San Francisco. With respect to those distances—advantage Beijing.

Resources—Physical and Human

Some countries enjoy the geological good fortune of being energy self-sufficient. Taiwan does not. Energy dependency is a reality in Taiwan’s political, economic, security, and social calculi. Prosperous societies with vibrant middle classes rely on energy for manufacturing, transportation, and quality of life. Taiwan imports 98 percent of its energy.1 That dependency is a vulnerability. Taiwan’s laudable renewable energy objectives hold p rom ise, b ut lim ited land availab le for solar energy is a p hy sic al reality . 2 Offshore wind farms are viable options but when realized add a new dimension of maritime critical infrastructure that will add to monitor-ing and defense needs.

Population density, limited agricultural land, and a declining labor force are factors in Taiwan’s low food self-sufficiency rate of 35 percent.3 These limiting factors will not improve in the coming years, keeping food imports an essential and critical import for Taiwan.

Image credit: Poster Collection, CC 196, Hoover Institution Archives.

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In the near and mid term, Taiwan’s demographics with respect to workforce, military service, and pub-lic expenditures are a predictable reality. Like other Asian countries where immigration is restricted Taiwan’s demographic trend is not favorable. A growth rate of .18 percent, a fertility rate that is below the 2.1 percent replacement rate, and a median age of 40.7 years portend policy challenges in the future. Taiwan’s population will peak in 2029 and its high median age will usher in a decline in its workforce and an inc reased dem and for elderly c are and health c are. 4 Those unavoidable realities will drive budget appor-tionment and policy and define the future workforce and armed forces. Technology will compensate for some of the human shortfall in the nonmilitary sector where adoption of technology is more readily accepted. The declining availability of young men and women for military service is real and, unlike the private sector, militaries do not readily assimilate new technology, often stubbornly holding onto the old. Taiwan is no differ-ent and the consequences of not confronting its demographic reality and thinking anew must be addressed b oldly and now.

Math Still Matters

Changing defense strategy to adjust to new circumstances can’t simply discount the realities of today. The interaction of the Air Forces of Taiwan and the PRC in 2020 was extraordinarily high and costly for Taiwan, and maritime and naval considerations will also continue to loom large for Taiwan’s security.

PRC naval force structure both in terms of capacity (numbers) and capability (effectiveness and quality) has grown impressively in the past two decades and some comparisons are worth noting. There are over 330 ships in the PLA Navy and construction continues at an impressive pace.5 T he Chinese Coast Guard numbers 255 ships.6 T he P L A Navy , ex c ep t for short ep isodic out-of-area dep loy m ents of sm all num b ers of ships, is concentrated within the First Island Chain. Taiwan’s navy has 86 ships in service; more than half are coastal patrol craft.7 Its small Coast Guard of 23 ships is not close to being on par in numbers, ship size, or c ap ab ility as that of the P R C. 8 The U.S. Navy stands at 296 ships.9 The American fleet enjoys a qualitative advantage, but only approximately 60 percent of the U.S. Fleet is assigned to the Pacific, with 11 of those forward dep loy ed to J ap an. T he rem ainder are thousands of m iles away .

PLA Air Force and Taiwan Air Force aircraft inventories are similarly imbalanced with fighter numbers 600 (Eastern Theater) and 400 respectively. The PLA Air Force’s fighter total is 1,500 and would inevitably backfill shortages and combat losses. The U.S. Air Force combat coded fighters number 1,011.10 T he P R C’ s Air F orc e and Navy regional concentration is reinforced by a Rocket Force of nearly 1,000 intermediate and lesser range ballistic missiles and 300 ground launched cruise missiles.11

China’s focus on “informationized” warfare integrates cyber operations into the PRC’s anti-access area denial strategy and architecture. The BeiDou satellite network enables full autonomy in positioning, naviga-tion, and timing (PNT) information for PLA ground, sea, and air forces and is the essential factor in precision weapon employment. Another contributor to precision engagements and overall situational awareness is China’s 120 reconnaissance and remote sensing satellites.12 A robust People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia also provides close-in maritime locating information and has and will interfere with U.S., Taiwanese, and other nations’ naval and maritime operations.

Scenarios

The United States’ ambiguous policy regarding Taiwan will likely remain. However, not p rep aring and invest-ing to deter and c ounter the P R C’ s designs on T aiwan or in the E ast and South China Seas is an unam b igu-ous policy. The most discrete moves: seizure of offshore islands, a blockade (complete cutoff) of Taiwan or quarantine (denying the entry of commodities), missile strikes on the island, and ultimately a full-on invasion must be addressed. But more consideration must be given to more extensive and aggressive “gray zone operations,” that activity between peace and war. It may include traditional military activity accompanied by cyberattacks on financial, power, transportation, government, and military networks. Even if U.S. forces were not directly involved in countering complex gray zone activity, they very well may be the only logistic

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lifeline to Taiwan. At a minimum U.S. forces will be heavily taxed in monitoring activity in the region and Beijing’s broader economic and political influence campaigns.

U.S. logistic support must come from Japan, Southeast Asia, Australia, Guam, Hawaii, or a very distant Alaska or California. Unlike strategists who have the luxury of expounding in generalities, logisticians must deal with facts such as the closest modern airbase in use by the U.S. is in Okinawa which is 460 miles from Taiwan. Guam is 1,720 miles away and Singapore, a key U.S. Navy logistic hub is 1,930 miles distant. Should Vietnam, the Philippines, and Thailand choose to support operations, the former Clark Air Force Base near Manila and Da Nang, Vietnam (Clark and Da Nang) are over 600 miles away. Thailand’s robust Utapao airbase is 1,900 miles from Taiwan, requiring a significant dogleg to avoid overflying Hainan Island.

Coordinated cyberattacks on Taiwan’s civil and military networks will complicate and confound logistic operations and disrupt life on the island. Cyberattacks on shipping terminals, transportation systems, and power distribution grids could constitute a quasi-blockade by jamming flows at ports of entry and inhibiting m ovem ent of sup p lies onc e they are on the island. Suc h interferenc e c ould b e undec lared and denied. Cy b er disruption can also occur at ports of cargo origin such as happened in San Diego and Barcelona in 2018.

Resetting

The PRC, since 1996, has reset the region economically and militarily. It has transformed the PLA and forti-fied its eastern littoral. The number of forces and geography seemingly favor Beijing. But rather than only speculate on the benefits of future technology, hardware, and a “when we have X” optimism, today’s reali-ties must be accounted for, confronted, and only then can there be a serious reset of capabilities, capacities, and c onc ep ts to address the reshap ed region. T his m ust go b ey ond j ust the m ilitary dim ension and address the “gray zone.” Indeed, Beijing’s potential activities must be viewed as a “gray region” with malign activ-ity and p ressure ap p lied surgic ally and in a c oordinated m anner around T aiwan, the SCS, and the E CS and malign activity in the cyber and informational domains.

Secretary of Defense Austin has properly addressed the “say-do” gap that has plagued the Pentagon. O verc om ing that gap falls on m ore than j ust the P entagon. Congress m ust adop t a renewed sense of urgenc y and address the changing nature of the range of contingencies in the Western Pacific. It must accept that the two dec ades of war in the Middle E ast have not p rep ared the U . S. for the c om p lex air and naval envi-ronment in the Pacific today. Maintaining accurate domain awareness over such a vast area requires capac-ity and robust networks, and the tyranny of distance will stress logistics, particularly in a highly contested environment. Moreover, the large operating base logistics model of the Middle East staffed by thousands of contractors is likely not an option for supplying wide area, multi-domain complex activity.

Rather than jump to an invasion scenario it’s best to start with what Taiwan might face today—increased operational pressure on its military accompanied by disruption to essential imports and domestic services. As recent ransomware attacks in the U.S. have demonstrated, disrupting essential elements of daily life are consequential and have broader political and economic effects. Cyberattacks, whether attributable to Beijing or not, will disrupt life in Taiwan. Detecting, responding, and recovering from malicious activity must encompass financial systems, power generation and distribution grids, ports and transportation nodes and networks, government services, and military networks.

A Starting Point

Much can and needs to be done to recast the security equation of Taiwan, the East Asian littoral, and the broader Indo-Pacific. Adoption of new concepts, technology, and systems must be undertaken with urgency. They must be developed, tested, and fielded much more quickly than today’s norm. Leaders in the executive branch and in Congress must not be satisfied with simply starting programs or announcing new concepts but rather with achieving quickly the intended outcome. The other top priority must be enhancing our abil-ity to rapidly move forces to the region and sustain high intensity protracted air and naval operations. The latter is a powerful and essential enhancement and signal to the region, and both are strategic and opera-tional imperatives. The following are worthwhile starting points.

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Taiwan

Taiwan’s dilemma demands a new way of doing things. It cannot continue to rely on old procurement strat-egies and operational concepts. However, it still must know what is taking place in and around the island. Accordingly, Taiwan must prioritize air, surface, and subsurface domain awareness systems to accurately monitor PRC military and quasi-military (i.e., Coast Guard and Maritime Militia) activity to respond effi-ciently and husband its under-matched force. This should include immediate recapitalization of airborne early warning aircraft while transitioning rapidly to a reliance on long endurance unmanned platforms. Investments should be made in high-speed unmanned surface craft for close-in monitoring of areas of mari-time importance (e.g., ports, critical infrastructure, and likely infiltration and landing areas). This is a good match with Taiwan’s technological competence and a shift to more unmanned systems, if done efficiently (no old staffing models) will mitigate its looming demographic pressures. The bias toward a preponderance of unmanned networked systems means turning away from small numbers of exquisite platforms that con-sume a disproportionately large portion of the defense budget.

Keeping the lights on and the island supplied are essential, and here Taiwan can lead in the development of an Integrated Conflict (not solely Battle) Management System. That distinction implies a whole of govern-ment and island monitoring and response system that encompasses military and nonmilitary conditions, operations, and infrastructure. Financial, transportation, power, and other essential utilities and services must be included. The military and transportation dimensions of the system must be able to rapidly inte-grate with U.S. and U.S. alliance Integrated Air and Missile Defense Systems, Battle Management Systems, and logistic networks.

To address the most stressing scenarios, a key component of Taiwan’s defense capability must include a robust, integrated coastal and shore defense system capable of precision anti-ship weapons (missiles and directed energy) and high-volume fires whose killing fields will be the island itself should Mainland forces attempt to gain a foothold. As adversary unm anned underwater and air sy stem s b ec om e m ore c om m on, defensive sy s-tem s to c ounter individual or swarm ing adversary unm anned vehic les m ust b e p art of that defensive wall.

Taiwan must prepare for protracted pressure along any or combinations of measures the PRC could apply. Ac c ordingly , adeq uate sup p lies of fuel, food, and m ilitary c onsum ab les and ex p endab les m ust b e m ain-tained, and the m eans and m ethods of resup p ly asc ertained and ex erc ised in advanc e.

The United States

Persistent American naval presence in the Indo-Pacific is a powerful and reassuring signal. Apart from a Taiwan contingency, the military growth of the PLA, the shifting balance of military power in the Indo-Pacific, and the economic importance of Asia demand an immediate rebalancing of U.S. force structure to 80 percent in the Pacific and 20 percent to the Atlantic rather than the current 60–40 apportionment. The cost of that realignment is not insignificant but biasing to the west is a strong strategic signal to the region. The primary impediment to such a realignment is domestic U.S. politics as eastern states are loath to see any migration of forces away from their respective states and economies. This is an important time and strategic imperatives must outweigh local politics.

Any military contingency in the Indo-Pacific will be logistically intensive and more sealift from the U.S. to the region will be required. Distances and assured resupply require more U.S. flagged ships as Beijing can be expected to use its global maritime footprint and clout to dissuade non-U.S. shipping companies from sup-plying Taiwan. Sadly, there are only 99 U.S. flagged ships engaged in U.S. foreign commerce today.13 Six ty of those ships can be called upon to participate in possible military contingencies and may be the only means to replenish Taiwan’s military supplies in a crisis. Moreover, U.S. leaders will have to decide how to apportion shipping to support Taiwan and what to retain for other military contingencies. Even if the decision is made to commit U.S. flagged ships, their average age of 45 years—nearly twice what is considered full-service life in commercial fleets—portends availability and readiness shortcomings. The shipping shortfall can be closed rapidly by purchasing relatively new excess capacity foreign built ships.

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Apart from moving commodities and equipment, in-theater sources of supply, primarily fuel, must be diver-sified and in-theater tanker aircraft and ships should be in the region continuously to respond promptly to contingencies and sustain persistent operations over large areas.

U.S. operational command and control organizations should be optimized for broader crisis response and combat operations in the Indo-Pacific. The U.S. Navy is a first mover in that regard with a proposal to estab-lish a new fleet headquarters with responsibility for the Western Pacific and Southeast Asia.14 Particular effort should be made to include Japan and Australia as key participants (not observers) in evolving com-mand and control organizations. Redesigned headquarters must be capable of exchanging military and non-military data, information, and intelligence relevant to gray zone activity to include information originating and terminating in Taiwan.

U.S. unmanned system procurement and operational concepts must go beyond variations of systems and operations used in the Middle East wars. Long endurance underwater systems must be developed aggres-sively. The creation of robust network architectures must be as much a focus as the vehicles. The systems m ust b e c om m only op erab le and interc hangeab le with allies, whic h req uires c odevelop m ent of c ontrol sta-tions and networks. The hard work of breaking down intellectual property and security constraints must be a priority. For allies and partners Missile Technology Control Regime limitations must be relaxed.

Japan

Japan and the strength, capacity, and resolve of the U.S.–Japan alliance will determine the future of the sec urity environm ent in E ast Asia. J ap an has long ap p rec iated and valued the strategic im p ortanc e of T aiwan as the key to controlling the vital sea lanes within the First Island Chain. The Alliance must have a coherent and coordinated approach to collective activity in the East China Sea, the areas around Taiwan, and the South China Sea. No longer can each be viewed in isolation.

Compatibility and connecting domain awareness platforms, methods, and networks are essential. Accordingly, the intelligence dimension of the U.S.–Japan alliance must be elevated to be on par with the Five Eyes intel-ligence alliance which should fold Japan into a Six Eyes or, as an initial step, a Five Plus One relationship.

Detailed planning for contingencies within the First Island Chain should be prioritized and must include responses to economic pressures that could be applied by the PRC to influence regional access and support. In that vein a key element of the planning effort must be logistic support to wide area operations and sup-port to a quarantined Taiwan.

As the U.S. evolves its command and control organization for the region, Japan should undertake comple-mentary changes with the initial step of creating a distinct operational joint warfighting headquarters.

Japan’s extraordinary maritime force is essential in maintaining dominance in regional undersea warfare. That should be enhanced with cooperative programs to develop and employ new families of unmanned autonomous undersea vehicles and associated networks.

Although politically sensitive, Japan should acquire and field a long-range strike capability. The complexity of defending its territory and forc es against advanc ed m issiles will inc rease in the c om ing y ears and to rely on intercepting every one is flawed. Striking the archer before the arrows are let go is a far more prudent and effective defense.

Conclusion

Taiwan is a unique democracy and a vibrant society. In the last great conflict in Asia, Fleet Admiral Ernest King referred to the unique and strategically important island as the “cork in the bottle.” It remains so today. In this time of challenge, it is time to think beyond military contingencies and examine more deeply how to support Taiwan over the long term, and what that portends for the region, U.S. allies, and America’s position in Asia and b ey ond. I hop e this p ap er op ened the ap erture for that disc ussion.

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Admiral Gary Roughead is a graduate of the U . S. Naval Ac adem y whose naval c areer c ulm inated in serving as the c hief of

naval operations. In that role he was a member of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. He held six operational commands and is one of only two officers

in the history of the Navy to have commanded both the U.S. Atlantic and Pacific F leets. Ashore he served as the c om m andant, U . S. Naval Ac adem y , and he was the navy ’ s c hief of legislative affairs. Admiral Roughead was also the deputy commander, U.S. Pacific Command dur-ing the relief effort following the 2004 tsunami. He serves on the boards of directors of the Northrop Grumman Corporation, Maersk Line, Limited, and the Marinette Marine Corporation. He is a trustee of Dodge and Cox Funds, and a trustee of the Johns Hopkins University. Admiral Roughead is the Robert and Marion Oster Distinguished Military Fellow at the Hoover Institution. He cochaired a congressionally appointed commission that reviewed the current administration’s National Defense Strategy and is active in nongovernmental policy discussions with China, Japan, Canada, and Mex ic o.

1 Evan A. Feigenbaum and Jen-yi Hou, “Overcoming Taiwan’s Energy Trilemma,” Carnegie Endowment for

International Peace, April 27, 2020, https:// carnegieendowment . org / 2020 / 04 / 27 / overcoming - taiwan - s - energy

- trilemma - pub - 81645.

2 Emiliano Bellini, “Is Taiwan Ready for GW-sized PV Projects?,” pv magazine, November 28, 2019, https:// www . pv

- magazine . com / 2019 / 11 / 28 / is - taiwan - ready - for - gw - sized - pv - projects / .

3 “Review of Taiwan’s Food Security Strategy,” FFTC Agricultural Policy Platform (FFTC-AP), Food and Fertilizer

Technology Center for the Asian and Pacific Region, September 10, 2020, https:// ap . fftc . org . tw / article / 2570.

4 “Taiwan Population Live (2021),” World Population Review, https:// worldpopulationreview . com / countries

/ taiwan - population.

5 Bryan Clark, Timothy A. Walton, and Seth Cropsey, “American Sea Power at a Crossroads: A Plan to Restore the

US Navy’s Maritime Advantage” (Washington: Hudson Institute, October 2020), 9, https:// s3 . amazonaws . com

/ media . hudson . org / Clark%20Cropsey%20Walton _ American%20Sea%20Power%20at%20a%20Crossroads . pdf.

6 Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China 2020, Office of the Secretary

of Defense, 165, https:// media . defense . gov / 2020 / Sep / 01 / 2002488689 / - 1 / - 1 / 1 / 2020 - DOD - CHINA - MILITARY

- POWER - REPORT - FINAL . PDF.

7 Ibid.

8 Ibid.

9 Hope Hodge Seck, “Active Ships in the US Navy,” Military . com, June 9, 2021 (updated June 23, 2021), https://

www . military . com / navy / us - navy - ships . html.

10 2021 Index of U.S. Military Strength, Heritage Foundation, November 17, 2020, https:// www . heritage . org / sites

/ default / files / 2020 - 11 / 2021 _ IndexOfUSMilitaryStrength _ WEB _ 0 . pdf.

11 Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China 2020, 166.

12 Ibid., 63–65.

13 Loren Thompson, “Expanded Cargo Preferences May Be the Easiest Way to Rebuild the U.S. Maritime Industry,”

Forbes, July 7, 2020, https:// www . forbes . com / sites / lorenthompson / 2020 / 07 / 07 / expanded - cargo - preferences

- may - be - the - easiest - way - to - rebuild - the - us - maritime - industry / ? sh = 276d2bf17136.

14 Ken Moriyasu, “US Navy Chief Wants Indian Ocean ‘1st Fleet,’ Possibly in Singapore, Nikkei Asia, November 19,

2020, https:// asia . nikkei . com / Politics / International - relations / Indo - Pacific / US - Navy - chief - wants - Indian - Ocean

- 1st - Fleet - possibly - in - Singapore.

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Ta iwan : De terrence o f Ch ina Is Fa i l i ngBy Gordon G . Chang

T aiwan, The Economist proclaims on its May 1–7 cover, is “the most dangerous place on earth.”

The Chinese foreign ministry says the island has been an “inalienable” part of China “since ancient times,” and Beijing demands Taipei agree to annexation. Should the United States try to resist a Chinese attack, it will, according to the Pentagon’s Franz Gayl writing in the Communist Party’s Global Times, lose. T aiwan, the paper said in April, “won’t stand a chance” if China invades.

Are any of these Chinese narratives correct? No. Most important, even though deterrence is clearly break-ing down, Washington c an reestab lish it. T he U . S. c an and should defend the R ep ub lic of China, as T aiwan is formally known.

Although Taipei calls itself “China,” Taiwan is not now and has never been “Chinese,” no matter how many times Beijing repeats its contentions. The People’s Republic has never exercised control over the island—actually a col-lection of islands—and the international community has not formally recognized any Chinese regime as the legiti-mate government of Taiwan. People in Taiwan overwhelming identify themselves as “Taiwanese,” not “Chinese.”

In short, China forcibly taking over Taiwan would be an act of aggression, not, as Beijing says, one of “re-unification.”

There are three principal reasons why Taiwan is critical to American security. First, since the latter part of the nineteenth century, Washington policy makers have drawn America’s western defense perimeter off the coast of East Asia, and Taiwan sits at the center of that line, where the South China Sea and the East China Sea meet. Taiwan’s islands protect the southern approaches to America’s “cornerstone” ally J ap an and guard the northern ap p roac hes to the P hilip p ines, also a U . S. treaty p artner. Moreover, T aiwan prevents the Chinese navy and air force from surging into the western Pacific.

Sec ond, T aiwan, although not a form al treaty ally , is seen in the region and elsewhere as a test of Am eric an resolve to defend allianc e p artners. F ail to defend it, and Am eric a’ s allianc e struc tures c ould fail.

Third, in these days of the Communist Party’s unrelenting assaults on democratic governance, America can-not allow Beijing to take over any democracy, especially one as important as Taiwan.

At the moment, America maintains a policy of “strategic ambiguity,” not telling either Beijing or Taipei what the U.S. would do in the face of imminent conflict. This approach worked when rulers in Beijing were im p ressed b y Am eric an p ower.

They no longer are in awe. China’s top diplomat, Yang Jiechi, in the Anchorage meeting in the middle of March, told Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan in no uncertain terms that the U.S. could no longer talk to China “from a position of strength.”

O m inously , B eij ing is op enly c hallenging Am eric a. Global Times, whic h the Com m unist P arty uses to signal future policies, on April 14 ran an editorial titled “When Real Determination Is Lacking, the U.S. Should Maintain ‘Strategic Ambiguity.’ ”

In effect, China’s leaders were saying they do not believe the U.S. will defend Taiwan because the military balance of power has shifted in their favor. Chinese self-perception of overwhelming strength is a sure sign that deterrence is quickly eroding.

So it’s time to restore it. As Joseph Bosco, a Pentagon China desk officer in the George W. Bush administra-tion, told me in April, “Given the dramatically changed circumstances, different words are needed now.”

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Pu t Nukes on Ta iwanBy Ange lo M . Codev i l l a

For three generations, U.S. diplomats have purchased what they imagined to be the Chinese Communist Party’s good will by serial reductions in America’s own geopolitical interest in Taiwan. They have refused to see that tiny Taiwan is key to Beijing’s political vulnerabilities and ambitions. The ambiguity and flexibility of

President Biden should publicly declare the United States is adopting a policy of “strategic clarity”; in other words, Biden should issue a clear declaration that America will defend the island. Beijing has publicly dared the president to issue such a declaration; a failure to respond will therefore have consequences.

Because it does appear China has, at least on paper, a stronger conventional force in the region, can America still deter Beijing?

Many say China’s most important foreign policy objective is the absorption of Taiwan.

That is not correct. China’s No. 1 foreign policy goal is the continuation of Communist Party rule.

T his m eans F ranz Gay l in his Global Times piece is incorrect. He mentions Beijing will defeat the United States over Taiwan because “casualty-tolerance” is “China’s decisive advantage in any fight with the U.S.” Its “whole-of-society commitment to core national security priorities is legendary,” he writes.

Xi Jinping may believe he can take the island but will not launch an invasion if he thinks the casualties will be too high. As much as he would like to be Mao Zedong, he almost surely knows he cannot do what Mao did in Korea in the early 1950s: lose over 900,000 or so soldiers and still maintain power.

So, yes, the United States can deter Xi by making it clear that the cost in Chinese life in taking Taiwan would threaten the rule of the Com m unist P arty . Washington c an, therefore, deter China in the T aiwan Strait.

And the sooner the U.S. speaks clearly the better.

Gordon G. Chang is the author of The Coming Collapse of China, Nuclear Showdown: North Korea Takes On the World, and the rec ently

released The Great U.S.-China Tech War and Losing South Korea. Chang lived and worked in China and Hong Kong for almost two decades. He is a

c olum nist at Newsweek and The Hill. Chang has given briefings at the National I ntelligenc e Counc il, the CI A, the State Dep artm ent, U . S. Strategic Com m and, and the P entagon. Chang frequently appears on CNN, Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, Bloomberg, CNBC, MSNB C, and P B S. H e is a regular c ohost and guest on The John Batchelor Show. H e served two term s as trustee of Cornell U niversity .

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U.S. policy made it easier for China’s Communist regime gradually to secure its domestic legitimacy as well as to reduce America’s influence in the Western Pacific. It also has enabled Beijing to establish the politi-cal and military conditions for forcefully taking the island. Acknowledging this error, reversing what has been basic U.S.–China policy since 1949 by putting Taiwan beyond Beijing’s reach politically as well as militarily, is essential to avoiding an increasingly likely war for the Western Pacific. Nothing would so surely c hange B eij ing’ s c alc ulus on T aiwan as the p resenc e there of nuc lear weap ons targeted on the P arty ’ s leadership .

The Republic of China (ROC), Taiwan, a mere 23 million people, challenges the Communist regime’s legiti-macy by reminding the mainland’s 1.4 billion Chinese that they are not free. Dominating the China Sea from the south to the north, the R O C is the fortress that B eij ing m ust c onq uer if it is to estab lish c ontrol over its ocean flank. And over Japan’s lifeline. So long as Taiwan is free, Beijing cannot expel American influence from the Western Pacific.

Taiwan’s place atop Beijing’s priorities has never been in doubt. From Chiang Kai-shek’s founding of the ROC on Taiwan in 1949, the Beijing regime demanded that the U.S. denounce it as the precondition for continuing its then good relations with the Washington foreign policy establishment. Secretary of State Dean Acheson agreed, and gave Beijing all that the U.S. political system allowed. That is why he refused to believe that Mao would challenge the U.S. in Korea. When Mao did sponsor and then lead the 1950 Korean invasion, the Truman administration ordered the U.S. Seventh Fleet to prevent the ROC from attacking Beijing from the rear. Thus did the estab lishm ent c om p ound its stup idity .

Two decades later, China’s Communist regime was in bigger trouble, having defied Moscow politically and militarily. It feared Soviet nuclear strikes on its own nuclear program, and was facing fifty-three nuclear-armed Soviet divisions on the Amur River border. It begged for help from the Nixon administration—the only p ower that m ight restrain the angry B ear. When H enry K issinger went to China in 1971, its p rim e m inister Zhou Enlai was over the proverbial barrel—the classic demandeur. Nevertheless, Z hou b oldly dem anded that the U . S. de-rec ognize the R ep ub lic of China on T aiwan as the p ric e for b eing allowed to p ull B eij ing’ s c hest-nuts out of the B ear’ s m aw. H enry K issinger agreed, in arguab ly his greatest show of inc om p etenc e. U . S. de-recognition effectively turned Taiwan into an international outlaw.

A decade after that, the Reagan administration proved to be a brief, partial exception to incompetence. At a dinner I attended as part of the Reagan transition team, China’s ambassador suggested, as Zhou had done with Kissinger, that good U.S.–China relations depended on America’s flexibility regarding Taiwan. Our group unanimously let him know that the Reagan administration’s interest in China was chiefly on what China was prepared to do “about the Bear.”

B ut the foreign p olic y estab lishm ent never wavered from its c ourse. Already in J anuary 1977, George H . W. B ush, direc tor of Central I ntelligenc e and rec ently U . S. am b assador to B eij ing, had sworn to a sec ret session of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the U.S. government knew nothing either about China’s mili-tary preparations against Taiwan, or even about a famine that had claimed millions of lives. As Reagan’s vic e p resident, B ush fostered the b eginning of the m assive U . S. c orp orate p resenc e in m ainland China, and resisted efforts within the administration to sell Taiwan armaments comparable in sophistication to what China was dep loy ing.

B ush 41, Clinton, B ush 43, and O b am a lived b y the m antra that B eij ing would grow in p eac eful resp onsib ility , the richer and more powerful it became. And that Taiwan was an irritant to that salvific process. Over that generation, our establishment’s identification of U.S. interests with the Chinese regime enabled that regime to build the world’s second-ranking economy and to become the Western Pacific’s dominant military power. Rather than using opportunities to moderate Beijing’s international behavior, this generation’s presidents have given that regime sound cause to believe that, after all is said and done, America would let Taiwan go q uietly .

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But this political confidence, coupled with its overwhelming military advantage in the region, has led Beijing’s regime to flaunt its determination to take Taiwan while humiliating the Americans. This “middle finger” policy was on display in January 2021, when Chinese aircraft made mock attack runs on U.S. carriers in the Taiwan Strait, and again in April, when some twenty bombers hooked around to Taiwan’s eastern side, em p hasizing that there is no safety for any Am eric ans any where near T aiwan.

Meanwhile, the regime has just completed the world’s largest heliport a mere 150 miles from Taiwan. Were China to invade, the first wave would arrive by air. Were China to strike, it could defeat organized resistance in 8–12 hours. Some 1,200 accurate ballistic missiles would strike every military target of any importance. Chinese fifth generation fighters, supported by AWACS, would sweep the skies of Taiwan’s obsolete F-16s. As the rem aining T aiwanese ground forc es m oved to defend the b eac hes, they would b e b om b ed. As the tanks were about to land, heliborne divisions would be hitting the defenders from the rear. Beijing has been b uilding this hard-m ilitary reality in p lain sight.

Suddenly , it seem s, som e in our foreign p olic y estab lishm ent are entertaining the p ossib ility that China might not be playing games. Of course, the attack would succeed. How would the U.S. government respond? Make war on China? What for? To restore the independence of an island the independence of which it had denounced, and that it had refused to protect? The U.S. would suffer geopolitical shrinkage. A Sino-Japanese war would b e am ong the c onseq uenc es.

Nothing Am eric ans say c ould deter this horrib le p rosp ec t, b ec ause no words c ould c ounter seventy y ears of U.S. policy’s ambiguity and flexibility to Chinese demands. There is no reason why Beijing should credit any U.S. declaratory policy, especially given its now deep grip on the U.S. political process atop overwhelming loc al m ilitary advantages.

Deterrenc e worthy of the nam e c ould c om e only b y dep loy ing forc es that c ould ac tually defeat China’ s military preparations. Such forces would also have to preclude the possibility that China would escape unac-c ep tab le c onseq uenc es for even try ing to invade T aiwan. Defending T aiwan would have to b egin b y p ro-viding a thick anti-missile defense—many batteries of AEGIS-ASHORE. But nothing could so surely deter aggression as the presence of nuclear weapons. Deterrence is what happened in the 1980s, when the U.S. deployed Pershing II missiles with W-85 nuclear weapons to Europe, targeted them on the Soviet leader-ship, and let it be known that they would be launched were Soviet forces to have invaded. The Pershings are gone. But other missiles and nukes could substitute.

Would such a move trigger war? On the contrary. It is difficult to imagine a less forceful, less unambiguous move, preventing war.

Angelo M. Codevilla is a p rofessor em eritus of interna-tional relations at Boston University. He was a U.S. naval officer

and Foreign Service officer and served on the Senate Intelligence Committee as well as on presidential transition teams. For a decade he

was a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution. He is the author of thir-teen books, including War: Ends and Means, The Character of Nations, Advice to War Presidents, and, m ost rec ently , To Make and Keep Peace. H is America First: John Quincy Adams’s Teachings for Our Time will b e p ub lished in O c tob er. H e is a student of the c lassic s as well as of E urop ean literature; he is also a c om m erc ial grap e grower.

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The De fense o f Ta iwan : A Mat ter o f Wi l l i ngness , No t Capab i l i t y

By Seth Cropsey

Taiwan lies within the United States’ defense umbrella out of strategic necessity. It is the critical link in the First Island Chain. If the chain is broken, China will be able to roll up U.S. defenses, attacking Japan and the Philippines from their exposed, Pacific-facing flanks. Moreover, Taiwan is China’s most likely target, given these geostrategic realities and the threat that Taiwan’s democratic, capitalist regime poses to the Chinese Communist Party. The U.S. does have the means to defend Taiwan, particularly if it chooses to fight forward and engage China before it can envelop the island. U.S. submarines and island-based missiles can disrupt likely People’s Liberation Army pincer movements, and U.S. carrier strike groups, ground-based fighters, and strategic bombers can support Taiwan during an air campaign. The question is not whether T aiwan is within the U nites States’ defense p erim eter, or whether the U . S. is c ap ab le of defending it. T he question is whether the U.S. is willing to commit to Taiwan’s defense, and the possibility of a broader conflict with China.

Seth Cropsey is a senior fellow at Hudson Institute and director of H udson’ s Center for Am eric an Seap ower. H e b egan his c areer in

governm ent at the Defense Dep artm ent as assistant to Sec retary of Defense Casp ar Weinb erger and sub seq uently served as dep uty under-

secretary of the navy where he was responsible for the navy’s opposition to defense reorganization, development of the maritime strategy, and naval special operations. In the Bush administration, Cropsey served as acting assistant secretary of defense for special oper-ations. Cropsey served as a naval officer from 1985 to 2004. His articles have been published in Commentary, Foreign Affairs, the Weekly Standard, the National Interest, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and other national journals.

The Ta iwan Quest ionBy Edward N . Lu t twak

Dividing the Taiwan question—does or should Taiwan lie within the defensive umbrella of the U.S., and, if so, does America currently possess the wherewithal to help Taiwan successfully repel a Chinese attack—the first needed determination is whether the US should defend Taiwan, and that determination must be made

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anew every time the question comes up, just as it would be made anew in the hour of decision by any U . S. p resident and his c hosen advisors.

There are many considerations to take into account in making that decision. The People’s Republic of China ( P R C) p ossesses nuc lear weap ons and its leadership is at p resent c entralized as never b efore b y Xi Jinping. Mao had even more authority for much of his career but lacked today’s communications, com-mand, control and intelligence (C3I) technology. Xi is the irascible product of a deeply traumatic childhood and desperately precarious adolescence and youth. Many in his exact position, including a half sister, died of malnutrition and neglect as Xi might easily have done in horrid Liangjiahe village in barren Yan’an of impov-erished Shaanxi province. Xi’s failure to deliver Taiwan after boasting so loudly of China’s risen power might lose him his job, and very likely more than that, given his own extremely cruel treatment of fallen leaders.

Given those fac tors, P resident B iden’ s dec ision in the fac e of an im m inent or ac tual onslaught would c er-tainly be the most weighty decision made by any president in the relatively short history of the American presidency. In the meantime, the military risks increase every day because the naval/air strength of the PRC inc reases every day .

The stakes are straightforward: defend Taiwan against an invasion actually underway, initiating a process in which the U.S. would certainly expand its own efforts if needed, as would the PRC, with no true, absolute certainty that the nuclear inhibition would remain in effect; or else, allow the PRC to occupy Taiwan, thereby establishing the PRC’s hegemony over East Asia—unless the Japanese themselves were to join the fight while still underway, and with escalating force while fully mobilizing at home, thereby defining Taiwan as nothing more than a weak outpost of fortress Japan (unimaginable a decade ago, such a sequence is possible now, and even probable now that high-level decision makers are discussing the possible role of Soryu-class attack sub m arines in the defense of T aiwan) .

Whether the government of Taiwan deserves to be defended at great cost and with greater risks is irrelevant of c ourse, and that is very fortunate for the T aiwanese governm ent b ec ause the answer m ust b e a resounding no!

First, the Taiwanese have broken their long-standing agreement with the United States (formed with their prior Kuomintang leaders) whereby they would reduce tensions by holding never-ending but calming unifi-cation talks with Beijing, while the U.S. undertook to prevent PRC attacks, or defeat them. Now only the U.S. reassurance stands, but not Taiwan’s risk-reducing diplomacy.

Sec ond, the T aiwanese have steadfastly refused to b uild up serious defense forc es, i. e. , distrib uted territorial and coastal defenses manned by reservists who have gone through intensive initial conscript training (a hard six m onths at least) followed b y short annual refreshers. T hat is what serious sm all c ountries do, e. g. , I srael, or Finland, which is ready to outnumber any invading Russian army with more than 600,000 refresher-trained reservists.

By contrast, Taiwan with more than four times the population, has half as many reservists who have received any recent training to speak of. In fact, Taiwan does not even have coastal (missile) artillery units manned by loc al reservists to c ap italize on its island geograp hy , b y c overing every invadab le c oastal segm ent with m ul-tiple batteries of anti-ship missiles of different ranges (all locally producible under license, or homemade).

What the Taiwan (“Republic of China”) armed forces do have are lots of high-ranking officers (the IDF gets along with a single, lonely three-star general) and expensive “Great Power”–style weapon systems (jet fight-ers, battle tanks, warships) destined to be destroyed by the initial missile strikes of a PRC offensive. Perhaps the best example of the hopeless formalism that cripples Taiwan’s military capability is the current effort to build eight oceangoing submarines budgeted at $2 billion each that will be operational someday, using resourc es that c ould have p roduc ed m any m ore sm all c oastal-defense sub m arines that would b e ready now. But the latter would only be useful to defend Taiwan, while the Republic of China navy, as it calls itself, wants the Big Power token of oceangoing submarines.

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President Biden has affirmed the “U.S. commitment” to Taiwan, but within his administration there are offi-cials who do note that the U.S. has declared that Taiwan is a part of China, so that the U.S. would be fight-ing to defend not T aiwan p er se, b ut the indep endenc e of its governm ent, whic h is indeed so indep endent that it refuses to make the task any easier by adopting a conciliatory diplomacy or, alternatively, a serious national-mobilization defense, my own preference by far.

Fortunately, the second question is easily disposed of: yes, the U.S. can defend Taiwan (though not necessar-ily its islands actually within the Bay of Xiamen) given the mostly theoretical nature of PRC naval and aerial capabilities: yes, the PLAN operates many warships, but their crews and their chiefs are still trained more to look good than to fight effectively; and yes, the PRC too has a “Fifth Generation” stealthy fighter, but its J-20 is still very much a work in progress.

T he one thing the P R C does have are very large num b ers of vessels in toto, b etween the P L AN form al navy , its large coast guard, and still more numerous paramilitary vessels . . . and that is why the absence of a Taiwan coastal (missile) artillery manned by local reservists everywhere is so damnable.

Nevertheless, if President Biden were to so decide, U.S. forces could definitely defeat an invasion of Taiwan; but then the decision to resort to nuclear weapons to nullify that outcome, or accept a defeat likely to be politically fatal for himself, would rest with Xi Jinping . . .

Edward N. Luttwak works as a contractor for the U.S. Dep artm ent of Defense and for som e treaty allies, and has served

as consultant to the White House chief of staff, the U.S. Department of State, and the U.S. Army, Air Force, and Navy. Luttwak also cofounded

and heads a conservation cattle ranch in the Amazon. His books, including The Rise of China viz. The Logic of Strategy, The Grand Strategy of the Byzantine Empire, The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire, and Strategy: The Logic of War and Peace, have b een p ub lished in multiple English-language editions, and also in 25 other languages, including Arabic, Bahasa, Chinese, Japanese, Hebrew, Mongolian, Korean, and Russian. He has also published other books in I talian and in J ap anese only , and has a num b er of honorary as well as ac adem ic degrees.

Stra teg ic Ambigu i ty and the De fense o f Ta iwan

By Peter R . Mansoor

As with so many foreign policy and national security issues today, the U.S.–Taiwan relationship stems back to World War I I and U . S. p olic y in the p ostwar p eriod.

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During the Second World War, U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt believed that the postwar world would be secured by the “Four Policemen”—the wartime alliance of the United States, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and China. This idea morphed into the United Nations, with the four great powers (plus France) becoming per-m anent m em b ers of the Sec urity Counc il. T he fall of China to Mao Z edong’ s Com m unists in 1949 led to the retreat of Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist government to the island of Taiwan, but the Republic of China (ROC) continued to hold China’s seat in the United Nations until 1971.

During the Korean War, the Truman administration extended economic and military aid to the ROC on Taiwan and employed the U.S. Seventh Fleet to neutralize the Taiwan Strait. After the intervention of the Chinese Communists in Korea in the fall of 1950, General Douglas MacArthur argued for the employment of ROC troops in the conflict. Truman declined to do so but placed a Military Assistance Advisory Group and the U.S. Taiwan Defense Command on Taiwan. In 1955 the U.S. Senate ratified a Sino-American Mutual Defense Treaty, which was in force until January 1, 1980, one year to the date after the United States recog-nized the P eop le’ s R ep ub lic of China.

Since then, the relationship between the United States and Taiwan has been one of deliberate strategic ambiguity. The United States maintains de facto if not de jure diplomatic relations with Taiwan. The 1979 Taiwan Relations Act states “the United States will make available to Taiwan such defense articles and defense services in such quantity as may be necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability.” U.S. arms sales—under both Democratic and Republican administrations—to Taiwan have included advanced fighter jets, air defense missiles, naval frigates and anti-ship missiles, attack helicopters, anti-tank weapons, tanks, and other weapons and equipment. The United States does not explicitly guarantee it will come to the defense of Taiwan should China attack, but as late as 1996 the U.S. Seventh Fleet intervened to neutralize the Taiwan Strait following Chinese missile tests and naval exercises put in motion to protest the granting of a visa to Taiwan’s president Lee Teng-hui to allow him to attend a reunion at his alma mater, Cornell University.

Officially, the United States supports a “One-China policy,” which asserts that China and Taiwan are parts of a single sovereign state. The United States seeks a political solution to the issue, rather than a declaration of Taiwanese independence or the forcible reunification of Taiwan with China. China and Taiwan also fol-low this principle, albeit with intractable disagreement over which is the legitimate government of the one China. This ambiguity has kept the peace, more or less, since 1949. But recently Chinese president Xi Jinping has refused to renounce the pursuit of unification via force of arms. China’s increasing military capabilities and bellicose nationalist rhetoric threaten to inflame tensions, especially as the Taiwan independence move-m ent grows.

The United States has three broad policy options: 1) to formalize a defense treaty with Taiwan to protect its sovereignty, 2) to retain the concept of strategic ambiguity, or 3) to renounce the defense of Taiwan, leaving it to defend itself in any conflict with mainland China. The Taiwan Relations Act commits the United States to “consider any effort to determine the future of Taiwan by other than peaceful means, including by boycotts or embargoes, a threat to the peace and security of the Western Pacific area and of grave concern to the United States.” This continues to be sound policy. A U.S. guarantee of Taiwan’s sovereignty would thrust the U nited States and China into a c old war, with grave and unc ertain c onseq uenc es for E ast Asia and the world. Ab andoning T aiwan p ub lic ly would inevitab ly lead to an invasion of the island, whic h would entail hor-rific consequences for the Taiwanese people and have a chilling effect on the nations of the region. Best to deter conflict by keeping China guessing.

B ut should China invade T aiwan, the U nited States should c om e to the island’ s defense. F ailure to do so would send a m essage that the U nited States will no longer p rotec t the world’ s dem oc rac ies from aggression, and seriously undermine U.S. power and prestige. China’s rise as an Asian hegemon would then b ec om e inevitab le, m uc h to the detrim ent of the U nited States and its allies in the region. T he United States currently maintains defense capabilities adequate to bolster this policy. But given China’s rapid military buildup, the military balance may soon tilt in China’s favor. Given Xi’s rhetoric, it behooves the United States to take his bellicosity seriously and to acquire the capabilities to win any conflict over

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U .S . Reso lve Is Ta iwan ’s Best De fenseBy Mark Moyar

Taiwan has enjoyed the protection of the U.S. defensive umbrella ever since the fall of Nationalist China to Mao’ s Com m unists in 1949. Although the U nited States ended its m utual defense treaty with T aiwan in 1979, it has continued to deter China from invading Taiwan by selling arms to Taiwan and maintaining the specter of military intervention. Although President Biden has in the past questioned the need to confront and contain China, recent Chinese behavior has made it more difficult for any American president to remove the protective umbrella. The slow strangling of democracy in Hong Kong has eroded American hopes that Taiwan could be peacefully united with China without losing its democratic institutions, and Americans are increasingly fearful of a Chinese takeover of the Taiwanese economy, especially its semiconductor industry.

Whether the United States has the wherewithal to help Taiwan repel a Chinese attack successfully depends on the nature of the Chinese attack and whether a successful defense is defined as one that spares Taiwan from massive physical devastation. It is conceivable that China would launch an attack so indiscriminate in its destructiveness that it would leave Taiwan in smoldering ruins. Beijing might view the physical damage as an acceptable price for the seizure of Taiwan’s territory and the termination of its democratic government. B ut suc h a c onq uest would dep rive China of ac c ess to T aiwan’ s high-tec h industries, assets that China’ s rul-ers c ovet.

An initial Chinese attack would therefore more likely begin the concentration of China’s most powerful military asset—ballistic missiles—on Taiwan’s military assets. Chinese missiles could devastate most of

Peter R. Mansoor, colonel, U.S. Army (retired), is the General R ay m ond E . Mason J r. Chair of Military H istory at T he O hio State

University. A 1982 distinguished graduate of the United States Military Ac adem y at West P oint, he earned his doc torate from O hio State. H e

assumed his current position after a twenty-six-year career in the U.S. Army that included two combat tours, the first as a brigade commander in Baghdad and his final duty as executive officer to General David Petraeus, commander of Multi-National Force–Iraq. His latest works are Surge: My Journey with General David Petraeus and the Remaking of the Iraq War (Yale University Press, 2013), a history of the surge in Iraq in 2007–8; and Grand Strategy and Military Alliances (Cambridge University Press, 2016) and The Culture of Military Organizations (Cambridge University Press, 2019), both coedited with Williamson Murray.

Taiwan, whether outright warfare or the kind of gray zone hybrid operations that have typified Chinese operations in the South China Sea in recent years.

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Mark Moyar has worked for twenty years in and out of govern-ment on national security affairs, international development, foreign

aid, and capacity building. From 2018 to 2019, he served as the direc-tor of the Office of Civilian-Military Cooperation at USAID, and previously

served as the director of the Project on Military and Diplomatic History at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC. He is author of six books, of whic h the m ost rec ent is Oppose Any Foe: The Rise of America’s Special Operations Forces (Basic Books, 2017), the first comprehensive history of U.S. special operations forces. He is cur-rently writing the sequel to his book Triumph Forsaken: The Vietnam War, 1954–1965. H e holds a B A sum m a c um laude from H arvard and a P hD from Cam b ridge.

Taiwan’s military assets in a matter of minutes. If Taiwan refused to capitulate after taking the initial blows, the Chinese c ould m ove ground forc es to T aiwan b y sea and b y air.

Should the Chinese simultaneously attack American forces to inhibit an American response, their weap-ons c ould destroy or seriously dam age m ost of the Am eric an m ilitary assets in the vic inity of T aiwan. T he Chinese government, however, might refrain from striking the Americans, in the hope that the United States would acquiesce to the defeat of Taiwan in order to avoid a great-power conflict, much as it acquiesced to Russian aggression against Ukraine in 2014. Even if the United States were not attacked, though, it might launch a counterattack with the full range of American conventional forces. No one can be certain how that conventional counterattack would play out, or whether it would escalate to nuclear war. Chances would be high, however, that Taiwan would suffer horrific damage, with highly adverse economic consequences for b oth China and the U nited States.

Admiral Philip Davidson, the commander of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, has spoken publicly of the need to increase American conventional power in the Pacific to deter Chinese attacks on Taiwan and other strategic allies. Increases in American conventional strength certainly affect China’s strategic calculus, by increasing the pain China would incur at the outset of hostilities and the amount of time the United States would have to marshal resources from elsewhere in the world. The situation is similar to that in Europe during the Cold War, when the United States did not maintain enough conventional power to ensure the failure of a conventional Soviet invasion b ut p ossessed enough to slow a Soviet advanc e into Western E urop e. T hen as now, never-theless, nuc lear p ower is the m ost c om p elling deterrent.

Deterrenc e, of c ourse, also dep ends on a nation’ s will to em p loy its c ap ab ilities. T he Chinese are unlikely to attack Taiwan unless they calculate that the United States has lost the will to come to T aiwan’ s defense. T he only way they would reac h that c onc lusion would b e c lear indic ations from the White House that the United States would not fight for Taiwan. Two of America’s most recent wars—the Korean War and the Gulf War—began when the United States gave indicators that it would not fight for allies. It is thus imperative that the Biden administration continue to make clear the willingness of the United States to defend Taiwan, and that it reinforces the message by continuing the robust arms sales of the previous administration.

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The Cruc ia l Impor tance o f Ta iwanBy Wi l l i amson Murray

T here ap p ear real m oral reasons why the U nited States should do every thing it c an to p rotec t the indep en-dent state of Taiwan diplomatically, politically, and militarily as long as the People’s Republic of China repre-sents a direct threat to American interests directly and globally. In nearly every one of its major international actions over the past three decades, its leaders have staked out positions that are inimical to the values that the U nited States p urp orts to up hold. T heir treatm ent of the U y ghur p eop le suggests a level of c allousness that b orders on genoc ide, in this c ase one that that destroy s the c ulture and religion of a p eop le without killing them—and an effort that has brought the most modern technologies to bear. Chinese disregard for international behavior in its relations to its neighbors in the South China Sea hardly needs mentioning to this audience. The behavior of creating military bases in that area represents, however, more of a political than a m ilitary threat.

The real threat to America’s position comes strategically in two areas in East Asia: the Senkaku Islands and Taiwan. Both of them represent distinct threats to the geographic advantage that the Americans and their allies enj oy in the great sweep of islands that lie im m ediately to the east of the Asian m ainland. Swinging south from Japan through Okinawa, then Taiwan and the Philippines and finally to Malaysia and Indonesia, that island chain blocks China in a military sense from access to the great spaces of the Central Pacific. Currently, the islands represent as great an impediment to Chinese strategy as the British Isles represented to the Kriegsmarine in two world wars. In effect Britain’s geographic position limited the German Navy to the North Sea and the northern entranc e to the E nglish Channel. 1

The Senkaku Islands represent less of a threat because Japanese and American naval and air forces appear more than sufficient to block any Chinese efforts to seize and utilize those islands militarily. Taiwan represents a different case entirely. Its control by the naval and air arms of the People’s Liberation Army would punch an enormous hole in the whole strategic geography of the current situation in East Asia. It would outflank Japan and South Korea to Taiwan’s north, putting both of America’s crucial allies in con-siderable danger. It would certainly make U.S. cooperation with those two islands more difficult politi-c ally and m ilitarily . E q ually seriously , it would p lac e the P hilip p ines, Malay sia, and I ndonesia in an even more dangerous strategic position, because none of those three nations possess the economic or military strength to resist Chinese pressure of any kind unless the United States is in a position to render significant m ilitary help .

Finally, and perhaps most important, possession of Taiwan by the People’s Liberation Army would open up a vast hole in the first line of island defenses that shields off the island chains in the Central Pacific, beginning with Guam on which America’s military strength in the Eastern Pacific rests. It would put the United States on the defensive throughout the Marianas rather than having them as jumping off points for operations on islands to the east. Moreover, it might well force America’s defensive line all the way back to the Marshalls and even H awaii.

And so does the U nited States at p resent p ossess the wherewithal to defend T aiwan? At p resent, this author b elieves that it does. B ut the larger issue is that we have every reason to want to ensure that T aiwan’ s defenses are such that the Chinese dare not undertake dangerous political or military actions against that crucial strategic piece of real estate. It might well involve selling the F-35 to Taiwan instead of the upgraded F-16s. But above all we need to ensure that our military ducks are in line to deter China from making the disastrous mistake of attempting to invade Taiwan.

1 One might of course object, what about the U-boats? Britain’s geographic position also played a major hindrance

in limiting the options open to German submarines in the course of both world wars.

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Ta iwanBy Pau l Rahe

Taiwan is a problem. It is a problem for China, and that makes it a problem for the United States and for what used to be called “the Free World.” There are two reasons for this. The first is geopolitical; the second is tec hnologic al, ec onom ic , and strategic .

The latter concern arises from the fact that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) cur-rently holds a monopoly on the production of the cutting-edge semiconductors necessary for supercomput-ers and artificial intelligence applications. For the time being, he who controls the fabrication plants on the island of Formosa controls computing’s future, and it is fair to say that he who controls the future of comput-ing controls the future of the globe. TSMC’s monopoly is a situation that the United States should not have allowed to develop, and it is a temporary condition. For the government on the Chinese mainland is putting vast resources into catching up with Taiwan in this particular, and if the United States does not develop an industrial p olic y aim ed at the sam e end, no one will b e at fault for the fate m eted out to us other than those who govern us. F or a while, however, b oth China and the U nited States and her allies will b e dep endent on Taiwan, and that really is a problem given the first reason for concern: Taiwan’s geopolitical situation.

Located roughly one hundred miles off the Chinese coast, Taiwan belongs to what is called the First Island Chain. As such, it sits astride two of the channels that serve as entrances to and exits from the seas that Nicholas Spykman once dubbed “the Asiatic Mediterranean.” It was this region and the mainland opposite that late Imperial Japan attempted to turn into what it euphemistically called “The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.”

For ancient China, the island of Formosa mattered not at all. The evidence from the Warring States Period suggests that the peoples on the Chinese mainland at that time were blissfully unaware of the existence of the island chain offshore. For the most part, thereafter, Taiwan remained of no geopolitical importance for

Williamson Murray is p resently the Marshall P rofessor at Marine Corps University in Quantico. He graduated from Yale University

in 1963 with honors in history. He then served five years as an officer in the U.S. Air Force, including a tour in Southeast Asia with the 314th Tactical

Airlift Wing (C-130s). He returned to Yale in spring 1969, where he received his PhD in military-diplomatic history under advisers Hans Gatzke and Donald Kagan. He taught two y ears in the Yale history dep artm ent b efore m oving on to O hio State U niversity in fall 1977 as a military and diplomatic historian; in 1987 he received the Alumni Distinguished Teaching Award. He retired from Ohio State in 1995 as a professor emeritus of history. His books include A Savage War: A Military History of the Civil War (Princeton, 2016) and America and the Future of War: The Past as Prologue (Hoover, 2017). His most recent books are The Culture of Military Organizations, edited with P eter Mansoor; and Gods of War, c oauthored with J im L ac ey .

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China. E x c ep t for one b rief p eriod in the six teenth c entury , I m p erial China was a land p ower that foc used its attention northward, westward, and southward but not eastward toward the sea. Even in the time of Mao, naval affairs were considered secondary. The presence of Chiang Kai-shek and the remainder of the K uom intang on F orm osa was an irritant b ut not m uc h m ore.

All of this changed with the ascent of Deng Xiaopeng—when China set out to become a modern commer-cial power; abandoned, in considerable measure, the communist economic model; and began exporting goods b y sea on an ever-ex p anding sc ale. O f c ourse, even today Chinese defense intellec tuals disp lay a Mackinderite bias. After all, the Belt and Road Initiative has as its principal focus overland transport by railroad, and it is easy for those situated in Beijing to suppose that he who controls Mackinder’s Eurasian heartland controls the world. But Spykman with his Rimland Thesis had a point, and Chinese defense intellectuals know that railroads alone cannot do the job. Sea transport is much, much cheaper—and the tonnage that railroads c an c arry c annot c om p are with what c an b e and is transp orted b y sea.

None of this would much matter if China were a status-quo commercial power intent solely on joining and profiting from the rules-based international order. That is not, however, the case—for contemporary China’s principal aims are political, not economic. In this regard, it more nearly resembles Louis XIV’s France, the Germ an K aiserreic h, the T hird R eic h, and late I m p erial J ap an than it does c ontem p orary B ritain, Germ any , Japan, and the United States. Its aim is to create something very much like Japan’s short-lived Greater E ast Asia Co-P rosp erity Sp here. What today ’ s Chinese ruling order wants is a variant of what its p rede-cessors always wanted: dominion—tribute and trade; and the goal is to extend this “co-prosperity sphere” well beyond the Pacific Rim. It is this aim that constitutes Xi Jinping’s “China Dream.” What is “a win” for the Middle Kingdom is, Chinese diplomats repeatedly say, “a win” for everyone.

But imperial dominion the Chinese cannot achieve without becoming the dominant power at sea; and, until and unless the western Pacific becomes a Chinese lake—with Chinese control of the entrances and exits to the various seas off their coast so that their navy has easy and secure access to the world’s oceans—this cannot be done. China’s recovery of Taiwan would, as Xi Jinping and his advisors are well aware, contribute mightily to this end. So, until and unless there is a change in the regime and the attendant regime impera-tives driving China, Taiwan’s centrality will be a permanent feature in the geopolitical landscape.

The stakes for the United States and for like-minded countries all over the world are high—for if they lose the leverage over China that their position athwart the exits from the pertinent seas affords them, they might well become China’s satellites. The sheer size of the China market, the capital that the Chinese have to invest, and China’s ruthless exploitation of its economic leverage makes this a plausible prospect.

B ut the fac t that T aiwan’ s indep endenc e is vital for Am eric an strategic interests does not m ean that T aiwan can be defended. From 1948 until the last few years, the United States had the requisite means. China’s navy was not a threat, and the Chinese could neither mount a successful invasion of Formosa nor impose a block-ade. All of that has c hanged or is ab out to c hange. T he Chinese navy is now form idab le, and it will grow m ore formidable with time; and the Chinese have invested a great deal of money in missile technology. They now have the capacity to destroy in short order with a missile strike every base that the United States has in the region, and the odds are good that they can also take out in a similar fashion all of the surface vessels we have in the western Pacific.

O f c ourse, it is b y no m eans c lear that an invasion would b e suc c essful. Am p hib ious landings are notoriously difficult to pull off; the Taiwanese army is well trained and well armed; and the Taiwanese appear to be will-ing to fight. Xi’s crackdown in Hong Kong has had a sobering effect. A blockade, however, would be possible, and without imports Taiwan cannot feed itself. Whether a challenge to such a blockade would be effective is unc lear.

What might work as a counter to China’s military superiority in this theater would be a worldwide embargo on Chinese trade. If the United States, its allies in the Indo-Pacific, the European Union, and the third-world

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Paul Rahe holds the Charles O . L ee and L ouise K . L ee Chair in the Western H eritage at H illsdale College, where he is a p rofessor

of history . H e is the author of Republics Ancient and Modern: Classical Republicanism and the American Revolution; Against Throne and Altar:

Machiavelli and Political Theory under the English Republic ; Montesquieu and the Logic of Liberty: War, Religion, Commerce, Climate, Terrain, Technology; Uneasiness of Mind, the Spirit of Political Vigilance and the Foundations of the Modern Republic ; Soft Despotism, Democracy’s Drift: Montesquieu, Rousseau, Tocqueville, and the Modern Prospect ; The Spartan Regime: Its Character, Origins, and Grand Strategy ; The Grand Strategy of Classical Sparta: The Persian Challenge; and Sparta’s First Attic War: The Grand Strategy of Classical Sparta, 478–446 BC . H is latest book—Sparta’s Second Attic War: The Grand Strategy of Classical Sparta, 446–418 BC—was released on August 5, 2020. Its predecessor was awarded the 2019 Strategic Forecasting Prize for the Best Book in Geopolitical Analysis. Professor Rahe writes on contemporary politics and c ulture for the web site R ic oc het.

countries under the influence of the nations in this coalition were to make it clear to China that commercial ruin would be the price exacted if they were to use military force to seize or blockade Taiwan, and if this were backed up by a credible threat that they would also institute a blockade on Chinese trade, that might be enough. Putting together such a coalition would, however, require statesmanship of the first rank on the part of the United States, but I cannot imagine the current administration summoning the energy and resolve to even make an attempt. It is telling that there is no one in a cabinet or sub-cabinet post today with a deep knowledge of East Asia. Personnel is policy.

Even, however, if such a counter were to be deployed, there would be this to ponder. Deng Xiaopeng was, like Josef Stalin, a cautious man—alert to what could go wrong and willing to wait. “Hide your strength,” he told those around him, “and bide your time.” Xi Jinping does not appear to be a patient man. He may, in fact, be like Adolf Hitler and Nikita Khrushchev—high-stakes gamblers, both. Taiwan really is a problem, and we may look back on the administrations of George H. W. Bush, William Jefferson Clinton, George Bush, and Barack Obama the way that Winston Churchill in 1938 looked back at the British administrations led by Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain. “Improvident stewardship” is the Churchillian phrase that comes to mind.

Defend ing Ta iwanBy Andrew Rober ts

In retrospect, the Reagan administration made one of its very rare foreign policy errors when it forced Taiwan to abandon its nuclear weapons program in 1988. If Taiwan today had the capacity to threaten devastating retaliation against Beijing for an invasion, we would not even be having this debate. Of course, it is well within the U nited States’ c ap ac ity sim p ly to give or sell a deliverab le devic e to T aip ei, b ut it is

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Andrew Roberts read m odern history at Caius College, Cambridge, from where he is a PhD. He has written Salisbury: Victorian

Titan ( whic h won the Wolfson P rize) , Masters and Commanders (International Churchill Society Book Award), The Storm of War: A New

History of the Second World War (British Army Military Book of the Year Award) , Napoleon the Great (Grand Prix of the Fondation Napoléon and the Los Angeles Times B iograp hy P rize) , Churchill: Walking with Destiny (Council on Foreign Relations Arthur Ross Prize), and Leadership in War: Essential Lessons from Those Who Made History. H e is the R oger & Martha Mertz Visiting Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford, the Lehrman Institute Distinguished Lecturer at the New York Historical Society, a visiting professor at the Department of War Studies at K ing’ s College L ondon, and a fellow of the R oy al Soc iety of L iterature and the R oy al H istoric al Soc iety . H e lives in L ondon.

unthinkable that the Biden administration would plunge Asia into the kind of crisis that such an action would undoubtedly provoke from the People’s Republic of China.

T he story of T aiwan’ s nuc lear weap ons p rogram is a long and c om p lex one, full of sudden stop s and starts (usually as a result of interventions from Washington rather than Beijing) and at one point in the late 1970s the T aiwanese were p ossib ly around two y ears away from develop ing a testab le weap on, although deliver-ing a bomb the 1,800 miles to Beijing seemed a very tall order for the technology of the day.

Far more often than the Left likes to admit, the USA’s intervention in the affairs of other countries has his-torically been to its benefit, but sadly that is not the case when it comes to the constant American interfer-ence in Taiwan’s perfectly legitimate right to defend itself in the only way that would genuinely deter the Chinese Com m unist P arty ( CCP ) from realizing its three-q uarter c entury -long dream of forc ing T aiwan into the People’s Republic. China has no right to do so—the Kuomintang were as (il)legitimate a government of Formosa as the Red Chinese were in Beijing in 1949—but that in no way lessens its lust.

It is fascinating to see quite how many of the world’s most intractable problems essentially stem from the willingness in the late 1940s to see partition and population transfer as an acceptable long-term solution. The partitions of Palestine, Kashmir, and China in that period still bedevil international relations. In some places it worked, however brutally, such as in Poland–East Prussia and in some former Soviet republics, but in others, such as Myanmar, the pain of the 1947–49 period can still be felt by peoples such as the Rohingya. For the CCP, the Taiwan situation is still considered unfinished business, however outrageous that might be to the rest of a world that conforms to a rules-based international order.

The fact that Taiwan is still not allowed to be a member of the United Nations is an outrage, not least against c om m on sense as it has op erated as an indep endent c ountry for alm ost three-q uarters of a c entury . Whether the Biden administration has the intestinal fortitude to deter further Chinese saber-rattling will be a key test of its mettle. Instead of the United States showing the foresight to allow Taiwan to build a nuclear device half a century ago—which it had the expertise, wealth, plutonium, facilities and (thanks to Canada) heavy-water nuclear “research” reactor to do—Washington insisted on her reactors coming under IAEA supervision. The Israelis never allowed their continued sovereign existence to be farmed out to the U.S., and neither should the T aiwanese have.

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F ive Reasons Why Ta iwan Shou ld L ie w i th in the De fense Umbre l la

o f the Un i ted S ta tesBy Mi les Maochun Yu

1. F or the sam e reason the Am eric ans defended West B erlin during the Cold War, because we all knew if West B erlin fell, freedom would die in that p art of the world. T aiwan is the m ost free and vib rant dem oc -racy in the region and is also at the forefront of today’s fight between freedom and tyranny, facing another authoritarian bully. Taiwan deserves America’s support if freedom and democracy still mean anything at all to us Americans. To let the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) take over Taiwan will inflict incalculable reputa-tional cost to the U.S. and our global leadership, let alone a devastating blow to our friends and allies around the world.

2. Taiwan holds a strategic choke point in preventing the CCP from breaking through the American defense perimeter in the western Pacific. Taiwan is the most crucial strategic stronghold in the First Island Chain south of Okinawa. If Taiwan fell to the CCP, America’s defense parameters in the Asia Pacific from Japan, the R ep ub lic of K orea in northeast Asia to the P hilip p ines and Singap ore in the South China Sea would b e broken up midway, and U.S. vital national interests in the Pacific, including Guam and Hawaii, in addition to glob al c om m ons suc h as the South China Sea and the T aiwan Strait, would b e sub j ec t to m ore im m inent and direct threats from the CCP. In this sense, defending Taiwan is also the first defense of the U.S. when the P eop le’ s R ep ub lic of China has c learly shown its b elligerenc e toward the U . S. interests in the region.

3. Taiwan is a key economic and technology partner of the U.S. that serves as a trusted supplier of vital p arts and m aterials to m any of Am eric a’ s vital industries, esp ec ially in elec tronic p arts and high-q uality semiconductor chips. To keep Taiwan’s vibrant democratic capitalism from the CCP’s domination is crucial to America’s endeavor to diversify the supply chains of our critical industries and alleviate our suicidal supply-c hain dep endenc e on the P R C.

4. Taiwan has the most sophisticated understanding, rich experiences, and highly efficient tool kits to deal with its old foe, the CCP that has now b ec om e a glob al threat. T he world c an learn m any things from the Taiwanese in dealing with the CCP: The miracle of Taiwan’s COVID-19 prevention and mitigation is critically hinged on Taiwan’s utter distrust of the CCP/WHO propaganda and lies from day one. In today’s global awak-ening to and c oalesc enc e against the CCP threat, T aiwan has p roved to b e a forc e for good, and an insp ira-tion for the Chinese world. If democracy should come to China one day, our best and most efficient partner should b e T aiwan. A p artnership with T aiwan, not its dem ise at the hand of the CCP , is c ruc ial to our c om m on c ause to eradic ate the CCP ’ s authoritarianism .

5. The 1979 Taiwan Relations Act mandates the U.S. government to maintain Taiwan’s defense capabilities proportional to the military threat posed by the CCP. Defending Taiwan therefore is not a new U.S. commit-m ent. I t ’ s b een a dec ades-long p rom ise and T aiwan has b ec om e a m aj or rec ip ient of U . S. m ilitary sales of key weapons platforms. That’s good for Taiwan, and it’s good for America too.

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Miles Maochun Yu is the Robert Alexander Mercer Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution. He served in the Trump adminis-

tration as the principal China policy and planning adviser to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Concurrently he is a professor of East Asia

and military history at the United States Naval Academy (USNA). His books inc lude OSS in China: Prelude to Cold War ( Yale U niversity P ress, 1997) and The Dragon’s War: Allied Operations and the Fate of China, 1937–1947 (Naval Institute Press, 2006). He is the author of many scholarly articles on China and military and intelligence history, and of newspaper col-umns. His numerous awards include the USNA’s top researcher award, U.S. Navy Special Action Award, and U . S. Navy Meritorious Servic e Award. H e rec eived a doc torate in history from the University of California–Berkeley, a master’s degree from Swarthmore College, and a bachelor’s degree from Nankai University.

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D iscuss ion Quest ions1. What are the relative m ilitar y strengths of the T aiwanese and the Chinese?

2. Can Japan, South Korea, and Australia help Taiwan to create deterrence?

3. What will be the role of North Korea in any Taiwanese–Chinese standoff?

4. Does R ussia c ontrib ute to tensions or reduc e them or neither?

Suggestions for Further Reading | ISSUE 73, July 2021

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Suggest ions for Fur ther Read ing• I an E aston, The Chinese Invasion Threat: Taiwan’s Defense and America’s Strategy in Asia

(Project 2049 Institute, 2017). https://www.amazon.com/dp/1546353259

• Hoover Institution 2020 Conference on Taiwan in the Indo-Pacific Region, “China’s Rise and Prospects for Security and Stability in the Indo-Pacific Region” (October 29, 2020). https:// www . hoover . org / events / chinas - rise - and - prospects - security - and - stability - indo - pacific - region - 2020 - c onferenc e - taiwan

• Strategika Issue 65, “U.S. Recognition of Taiwan” (May 29, 2020). https:// www . hoover . org / publications / strategika / issue - 65

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